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[proline-II]

i don't remember the exact year i got my first bike but it may have been around 1972, i was 7. like most it was a department store dragster with the big bars, sissy bar with banana seat and a 3 speed shifter on the top tube. it was like that til about '77. the butterfly bars got canned in favour of some motorbike bars we probably found at the tip. the shifter was pulled and a coaster brake wheel was found and had the brake pads removed from inside to make a home made freewheel. back then we only had single clamp goosenecks so a tin can was cut up for spacers so the gooseneck would clamp the thinner bars. pulled a single seat of a racer and went jumping. i was doing metalwork at school by '78 so i took the frame into class and cut the 2 small side bars of the front of the frame and welded in a little rod between top tube and down tube just behind the head tube to form a crude gusset. it never snapped so i assumed it worked. the biggest bummer with those old dragsters was the damn cotter pins constantly chewing the insides of my ankles. always had bloody socks. not long after that my old man took us to the gold coast for holidays and i found a bike shop somewhere around palm beach i think. anyway i strolled in never ever having been in a bike shop before and saw all the stuff that was designed for bmx. i bought a pair of tange TX-500 fork and finally a double clamp stem. you's all know those black steel ones..........and i saw my first ever bmx magazine. bought it too
i kept that bike a bit longer then i got a job at the local woolies. then i saw an ad somewhere for quicksilver and started saving. i think it was late '78 or early '79 when i finally got my first REAL bmx frame and transferred all my bits off the dragster to it. christmas that year my sister and her boyfriend bought a beautiful set of gold wheels for the quicky. here's my replica of it, i did early last year



that bike was good at the time. it went through various guises over a 2 year period. evetually i got a job at the local sports store doing bike maintainence. which was cool, because by then the owner was onto the bmx thing that was happening and got to see most of the gear that came in before anyone else. i also convinced him to bring in the yank magazines, action and plus,.
one day i went to work and he had a current redline catalogue and he showed me the latest from the US, which turned out to be the proline-II frame and fork kit. i had to have it. so i sold my quicksilver frame and fork and had to ride around on my old man's racer for a few months til the redline got in. February 1982 i received it, then i built it up with most of the stuff off the quicky but by the middle of '82 it had changed to proper redline colours of chrome/silver and red. i'm currently doing a replica of that1982 version. here's a sneak peak



pretty much by the middle of '84 i was copping a bit of peer pressure about still riding bmx at the age of 19, you know big kids on little kids bikes etc. so i sold everything and have resented it ever since.
my hat goes off to all the fellas that still have their rides from their childhood or youth as i wish everyday i could have them back. at least i have the replicas which is close. sorry for the book, i got carried away 

[COASTY]

Cool story Allen. I think everyone had one of those dragster/mx bikes. Except me! Thats why I built the Bratz black biatch.
That shop you went to at the Goldy was probably Mikes Bikes and it's still there. There was also Palm beach Cycles and another at Kirra beach. Mikes Bikes was definately the big shop though. I got my first series one plate there when they came out.

[K8SY]

Excellent story Allen. I'm with you if only booze, cars and the power of the feral cat (code there)  didn't drag us away from our precious BMX...., but the old dudes are back now so look out punks.

Your replica's look awesome by the way!

Cheers

John

[proline-II]

thanks fellas. i received my wheels for the proline build so keep an eye out for the build story in a couple of weeks time.

Glenn, for the life of me i cannot remember the name of the shop, i only sort of remember where it was. interesting to hear it's still there after 30 years.

[ChickenVenus]

Hi all,

My story is similar to some other peoples, it goes like this.

In Melbourne in the early 70’s I started out with a Malvern Star dragster at school. At the time the other kids mainly also had dragsters, one or two had a smallframed  ‘racer’, but a couple had a ‘Raleigh Chopper , this bike impressed me at the time.

Moving forward in time and moving to Brisbane in ’78 I first noticed a couple of ‘monoshock’ bikes, including, yes the plastic ‘fuel tank’, I don’t think I was that impressed, but they did get my attention.

Next up I started to notice various dragsters turning up which had been painted matt black, racer seats installed, along with knobby tyres and MX style handlebars, most of the dragster elements had been removed. Some handlebars were from actual motorbikes. These converted home made ‘MX dragsters’ really got my attention. I remember mainly just admiring the look of a stripped back dragster, and those chunky tyres and no mud guards, seemed very cool.

Around this time I bought a Malvern Star MX, this is essentially a manufactured version of the black dragster MX bikes everyone was putting together, with heavy duty wheels and fork. I replaced the frame and various parts of this soon after as the ‘BMX  Craze’ arrived fully in our area. My brother and I both rode MX20 Madisons and turned over parts etc as we could afford them from this point onwards.

The bikes that impressed me at this time were –
The original Mk1 Quicksilver (I liked the Red with yelllow Tuffs)
Mongoose (Motomag) - with virtually all white parts especially Frame, Tuffs and tyres. To see a  bike arrive at our local ‘track’ where all of our bikes were black/dirty that cruised into our midst 100% clean and in a white colour scheme made an impression on me.

I also liked the Jag BMX bikes, (I like for example the little Jag cat sticker with it’s little paw up), and I recall a very nice classy Redline.

By about 1981 I had stopped being involved in BMX, so my impressons are really set in place back in this period.

I have recently become interested again in BMX and have really enjoyed this and other such sites.

I have been picking purchasing a few frames, bikes and parts in recent months, but I’m particularly keen to recreate my original Madison MX20, and hopefully this year.

Does any of this sound like you too?

Regards

ChickenVenus

[COASTY]

hey chickenVenus. It sure does sound like all of us. Your right in my timeline of bmx too. Where abouts was all this taking place for you?
Heres some of my era builds.
My motomag. I built this in 81-82.

Black dragster, yeah done that too...

Phil loves this shot. MMMMM Skyways lol

[ChickenVenus]

Hi COASTY,

"Where abouts was all this taking place for you?"

Mt Waverly, Melbourne til '78, then Sunnybank, Brisbane til 81 or so.
In Brisbane we were fortunate as there was a lot of housing/commercial development going on at the time, so lots of places to ride. I also rode at the famous Windsor track at times, and we went to race meets at a track in Ipswich. There was a massive abandoned supermarket quarry at Sunnybank that has been mentioned around in various sites, it was called either 'Red Dirt Hill or 'The Red Hill', depending upon who you talk to, that was a place to be seen to be believed...There was also a small track we were able to build with council permission near the Sunnybank Railway station.

I liked it all really, but mainly just hanging out and messing about on tracks and jumps we made ourselves.



Your bikes look great by the way, very good. Cool you have the 81-82 motomag still...

[oztorker]

HI troyboy,
I came across this post sorry for the late reply!!
Dragsters were our first BMX bikes we used old moto bike bars and knobbey tyres if we could get them!!
My first bike apart from the dragster was a SIGHT half CROMO i saved up and bought this bike new.
With out putting down "War & Peace" tonight I was in it from the start I Raced in the seventies until the mid eighties when BMX was king!!
I am amused now we have an Olympic BMX team in the new milemien when back in the day not just in AUS BMX was HUGE!!
Racing was the best every weekend Saturday and Sunday we raced, I can not begin to tell you how much BMX was so exciting and competitive back then.
I know I'm bias I think our bikes and gear look better than today.
If  BMX was an Olympic sport back then the current riders would be struggling to get a spot in the team here and the USA.
The bike im restoring is the bike i raced 28+ years ago I respect the fact you guys are rebuilding the old bikes and love to see them I wish more ex racers would get ivolved .
cheers
Howie
     

[proline-II]

cool as boys, keep the stories coming.

it's very interesting to see nearly all of us basically had the same progression of bikes, yet we all lived in hugely different areas of the country. personally, i believe the 1978-1982 era of bmx was THE era as that's where most of the frames and components became bmx specific. i'm glad i was there for it 

[ChickenVenus]

A great thread this, so many memories are triggered. I was glad that I was also around where and when I was, good days.
I also kind of find the current bikes in the stores these days sort of uninspiring/drab.

[Tim]

You guys are too good at this bike building, I'm going to have to get rid of all my bikes because they look like rubbish in comparison lol.   Mid school here I come!
there are so many great bikes that have wonderful memories here

[GTHODAD]

My 1st bike was a Sportsworld MX121 , 80-81. Next bike was a Team Mongoose with TRX forks 81-84. It got stolen.   Around 1982 I got a Kos. Got a Supermax crmo around 1986 . Late 80s I built up a Prosight Aero . Ive ridden an early PK Ripper and I thought it handled crap. I usually tell within the first bunnyhop and wheelie whether a bike is any good. My dream bikes were Redline Proline and JMC Black Shadow. I loved Pattersons but not the PR200s. They look crapola.
BMX to me was never about racing-more about bunnyhops, rockwalks, endos, trails, cruising, jumping kerbs and dirt jumps-spent many many hours shovellingdirt to make jumps, snakepits and berms. Tried racing & wanted to like it but the whole scene was crap. Raced at Knox and Frankston. My best memories were at local trails and hidden jumps usually near quarries train tracks schools etc and the never ending swapping out of parts. Yep the bike tinkering was 60% of the fun of BMX for me. Sound familiar to anyone else?

[COASTY]

Certainly does mate. I was exactly the same. I raced for a few years but jumping and Skateparks was much more fun.
I built lots of bikes and loved it.
I too hated the way my PK rode. It was horrible.

[Adrian H]

Im hearing what you say GTHO, man we should catch up for a ride one day.

[Night Rider]

Hi all
Just thought I'd better say hello from England and say a bit about myself. I got my first BMX for Xmas 83' it was a Raleigh 'Night Burner' (I think you guys got the same Raleigh bikes but they were called Rampar's instead of Burners. Anyway I stored it in my uncles garage when I went away to Art college in my early 20's. Then about   a year ago found I got talking to a mate in a pub about the old days and our BMX's, I wondered if my old childhood steed was still hanging in my uncles garage. Thinking he'd have chucked it years ago I gave him a call. He said I kept this bike in my garage about 20 years come round and get it. Hanging up looking pretty sorry for itself but not in too bad a shape was my old childhood steed.
I found a great forum burnerworld.co.uk were I found all the help and knowledge to restore my Raleigh Night Burner back to her glory. On the forum I won Bike of the month competition March 2010, That blew me away I'd never restored a bike before. I took it to the annual Burner Bash held every year in May in the UK were Raleigh BMX enthusiasts meet up for a weekend of camping BMX's and beer. there are hundreds of bikes shown and judged. I won best mk1 Burner in show, and 2nd place 'Peoples Champion' (voted by the viewing public) first place was Craig Schoefield restored race BMX from bitd which I was more than happy to come second to. The trophies for all the categories were presented by Craig Scofield and Andy Ruffel giants of bmx bitd and real nice guys to meet. I got the bug for restoring old Raleigh burners. I know Raleigh didn't make the best around in the early 80's but It's what I remember my bro and me kicking around on through those long hot summers of my childhood.










I'm currently building a Raleigh 'Super Tuff' Burner (gold frame forks and bars and black skyways). I need a pair of gold straight weinmann levers in mint condition. Cheers for reading.